Entitlement Free Children

​ The title of this article sounds a little like a children’s book; My Doggy Miffy. Anyway, moving on, my dog Miff is 119 in dog years – she’s pretty old, but she’s still with us, despite many mishaps she has had along the way. Some might call these mishaps tragedies, whilst some, like myself, realise that she is an amazing dog and certainly one of a kind!I’m not going to share all of Miff’s ‘adventures’ or we would be here until this time tomorrow, however I will share a few mishaps– they are not ‘favourites’ but they certainly make me proud to be her human.Let’s start with the time she got hit by a truck. We were living in rural South Australia but had purchased a property in the outskirts of Adelaide and were visiting this property over the weekend. For some reason Miff was on the wrong side of the front gates and made her way onto the road, along came a truck, I don’t think we need further details. We scraped her up off the road and rushed to the vet surgery; about twenty minutes to the nearest town. It was Sunday, the vet wasn’t there and had to be called out. Long story short, vet said next 48 hours were critical and he would do all that he could for her. Now I mentioned it was a Sunday, therefore I had to leave her at the vets and return to my job in rural South Australia, about six hours drive from where Miff was to stay the next few nights. Jump ahead to the happy ending, she fully recovered (although it took a few weeks for her innards to unwind) and we were reunited the next weekend.Christmas 2013 – our first Christmas in Queensland without family; worst Christmas ever for a variety of reasons. After Christmas lunch we went for a swim at the beach, it was nice and the kids had a great time. We arrived back home and an hour or two had passed until we realised Miff wasn’t around –we searched high and low, we went out on our bikes yelling her name, asking strangers if they had seen her – nothing! I worried all night, she’s only a little dog and someone had mentioned that perhaps a hawk had taken off with her. Not helpful. The next day – nothing. We printed up missing signs and stuck them around the town – still nothing. I cried myself to sleep. The next day – nothing. We continued to look for her but hope was fading. The next day – nothing. This particular evening we decided we needed to say our goodbyes and I only hoped she wasn’t somewhere in pain. We each lit a candle and said a little prayer for our gorgeous, gentle, beautiful little girl. We all cried and cried. In fact, I still cry now just thinking about it. The next day came and went and I was serving homemade pizzas for dinner and lo and behold at the back door waiting to come in is our little Miff, acting like nothing was wrong. We cried again, but these were happy tears. We often wonder what she got up to for those few days – if only she could talk.My last story of Miff that I will share is also a near death experience for her. Last year we adopted a big puppy from the RSPCA –Ella is her name and she is made up of many breeds including kelpie, border collie, greyhound, labrador…..you get the picture. We have always kept the two dogs separated if we are not home; Ella out the back and Miff on the back deck. Now, in my house, the back deck then steps down to the backyard through secure gates, however, this particular day, the gates weren’t so secure and Ella had come up on the deck to play with Miff (keep in mind Miff is over 100 years and Ella is a puppy a couple of months old) – Miff does not want to play! From what we can gather, Ella has just continued to ‘play’ with Miff for hours and we arrive home to a deathly looking Miff on the ground and Ella just sitting nicely. Once again we scoop Miff up and head to the vets – this time it’s just up the road and they see to her straight away. Diagnosis appears to be that Miff has had a stroke due to stress, take her home, love her, try and get her to drink, bring her back tomorrow if she survives through the night. I take my lump home, I try and make her comfortable and I lay down next to her and encourage her to live. I cry. Another sleepless night as I am constantly checking for breathing. I finally fall asleep around 3am and wake again at 6am. What I wake to shocks me; it’s my old Miff, she’s survived the night and appears to be quite spritely. I can’t believe she has cheated death once again.So those are some of the tales of my dog Miff. Currently we are going through a never ending heat wave up and it appears that Miff is struggling terribly, she scared us the other day as she laid just on the floor, with her tongue hanging out and her eyes closed, her breathing was laboured and I thought it was possibly going to be her last trip to the vet, however as my eldest child reminded me “Mum, it’s Miff, she survives everything”.I think she may just go on to be the oldest living dog in the world.